Comments on: Why the Oil Spill isn’t BP’s Fault

By: Josh

Josh — Tue, 22 Jun 2010 19:46:51 +0000

BP did not own the rig, it was owned by a US company called Transocean. Transocean were being paid $500,000 a day to mantai the rig, including a key part in the well to prevent blowouts, which in this case killed 11 men.

By: Jono

Jono — Mon, 21 Jun 2010 06:04:47 +0000

This reminds me of an excellent article I read a few years back that gave a prime example of how property rights lead to better environmental management over common ownership.

That example was the French regulation of their oyster industry during the 18th century, versus the British example of leasehold arrangements. The French went through a wave of crises as overfishing occurred, whilst the British never suffered the same problems.

I only wish I c0uld find the link to the original article. It highlights just how government management is completely un-sustainable and private ownership leads to all kinds of environmental resources – fish, trees, coral, flowers – never running out and being renewable.

By: Rod Campbell-Ross

Rod Campbell-Ross — Mon, 21 Jun 2010 04:02:07 +0000

I agree that private property rights and law are the best economic framework in the context of a world without limits. Unfortunately we no longer live in a world without limits. When the global population went past 4 or 5 billion people (pick what ever number suits you, it is less than 7bn) limits became relevant. Now that is the case the oceans and the air, the two commons absolutely critical to all life on earth, must be collectively managed. And that implies socialist responses, which in turn means two things. 1. All free marketeers such as Kris are vehemently opposed to “the Green agenda” irrespective of its scientific merits (eg AGW) and will do and say anything to discredit the science, the scientists and its supporters; and 2. We have to change because BAU (Business As Usual) is not an option. For instance: global oil production is declining and will decline faster following the BP/GOM debacle. That will force our economies to change irrespective of what anybody thinks. The problem requires a centrally planned response. Once it becomes clear that sea levels are rising rapidly and many great cities including Sydney, Melbourne, Shanghai, London and New York are threatened because of AGW there will be a global panic and a rapid adoption of a moratorium on coal, virtually the sole AGW culprit. This will be true irrespective of the impact on our economies. It will also be too late. In fact it is already to late.

By: Harry

Harry — Sun, 20 Jun 2010 08:40:28 +0000

I am a mettalurgist, and had part of my (practical)training with “Royal Shell” (KSLA). I also pressure tested pipes.Aboveground.
What would the world think if there were a Gas-Explosion? Not the fault of the carrier of the gas/energy corporation ?What about the “disaster in India a few years back.Who paid for that? What if a refinery here would have an explosion?Would “rudd” fix it, or have to fix it?,Out of our taxpayments?We would shove it back to the refinery ownner,would we not?
Coming back to Shell, they had a MASSIVE testing laboratory,
nearly fifty years ago (candidate for senility?),one of the most impressive in the world .Some of their test benches went through THREE floors. On someof their test the WHOLE building would shake.
To me it is a shortcoming of BP one way or the other,probably coupled to bad luck.
Who would be responsible if an “act of God” happened? And ruptured the setup. Earthquake?
If I owned that peace of ocean realestate –or YOU ?—would you have 2 billion PLUS!! for spare to fix the blow out?
Still to my mind: It isBP’s Bunny,if they go bust because of it..so be it,
Though i would be seriously sorry about it.From Shell I learned that BP is not owned by BP only , also by Shell, and Caltex etc.
Consequently WE ALL have to pay more for our fuel.So be it.
More truckies going bust.
CATS…?? I cried when my cat of 18 y old died, here in Australia.Nearly 20 years ago.I still feel sorry.BUT!!! Live Cats as a pet should not be in Australia, not more than CANE-TOADS!! Cats are just more appealing and charming; which one is more disasterous to the Ozzie Fauna? I don’t know. High taxes on cats…that is not politically appealing.

By: borg

borg — Sun, 20 Jun 2010 06:22:26 +0000

once again a stupid article by a one eyed privately biased idiot… “private” doesnt equal responsible… private equals ‘do whatever I like to make the most profit’!! and thats exactly what BP did. cut corners to ensure the most profit… but now its bitten them hard! I only hope these private companies learn the lesson! unlike the author of this article!

By: OREO-ruddxpin-BASHER-BUMMER

OREO-ruddxpin-BASHER-BUMMER — Sun, 20 Jun 2010 05:06:25 +0000

@ 28 I’d be interested to know… """""""""""What i do know about Joye is that he is one of Australia’s main property spruikers whose business (Rismark Int) has vested interests in perpetuating the lie that Australia’s property market is not in a bubble. Having read only a couple of Joye’s comments and articles on his blog site i can already tell that he has published misleading information (i.e. blatant lies) on his blog, for example his claims as to the ratio of property prices to average income in Australia is pure fiction. When will we get an apology from him for the tripe he’s been spouting about Australia’s mystical property market?? After the crash perhaps? IF he’s man enough to apologise that is, which i suspect he isn’t, we probably would not have to wait a very long time then…""""""""""""""" when it/if it all goes belly-up ..it wouldnt matter to him as he's got more than enough money to LIVE IN MAJORCA

By: Drowning Dolphin

Drowning Dolphin — Sat, 19 Jun 2010 19:36:23 +0000

I agree with Steve in that the suggestion of privatising the Oceans is coming from a soul that likes to brag about its ability to survive without government intervention. I think he is just trying to cause argument for the sake of it. Anyone with a passion for human rights, knowledge or nature should be horrified by the suggestion. The fact that he had to apologise to a property spruiker infers a provocative style and lack of tact but this is ridiculous.

By: Otto

Otto — Sat, 19 Jun 2010 09:27:19 +0000

Hello Kris , I really have to say you are way off beam with this one . The headline already suggested to me that not all is well with this article and sadly it was . Perhaps you will all have us own a wild Lion or Crocodile in future to monitor their activities and prevent problems . There is far more care required by the Oil companies . If BP is financially able to pay the huge costs involved in the clean up then the money must be there in the first place to fund environmental protection right from the start .

By: Jon Wexler

Jon Wexler — Sat, 19 Jun 2010 07:32:57 +0000

Kris,
If you owned a fishing business or beach house on the Gulf coast you’d be looking a whole lot differently at this massive disaster instead of pissing about with irrelevant wildlife population counts and smart-arse, totally fallacious propositions about catastrophe avoidance from privatising the seas. I’ll be taking future utterances from you with far greater salinity.

By: David Gray

David Gray — Sat, 19 Jun 2010 05:38:08 +0000

Who would you choose to regulate and inspect etc a project like the BP Well? The Technology is so new only a handful of people would even understand the entire chain of innovations they needed to drill at such incredible depths and pressures.

Reading BP’s earlier words regarding the number of ‘Teams’ working on separate problems…down to the last ‘Widget’.

Statistically if the chance of catastrophic Failure is 100:1 and you repeat that action a 1000 times then a failure is statistically inevitable.
JP Morgan owns a substantial amount of BP. Also our friends at Halliburton (I wonder how Dick Cheney is doing?) were involved with critical elements in the project.

Is there such a thing as a Spill Ship? A fleet of ships designed to deploy and contain these Mega Disasters. I say Mega as it seems the erosion effect on the underground pipe is probably if the pipe is ‘cut through’ we will have an open hole under 5000 feet pumping Crude at rates of 50 -70 Thousand Barrels a day unstoppable even with relief wells.

Our love of Oil will have ramifications far beyond imagination. God help us when the inevitable Hurricane comes along.

This event was bound to happen, the US Govt is powerless to do anything but posture and placate as this Pipe deteriorates the BOP will collapse, oil & Gas will start bubbling up from the sea floor. We / They are in the S**t.

BP Global – Reports and publications – Thunderous innovation

“The list of development breakthroughs is formidable even by the standards of large oil industry projects, pushing technical know-how out to new boundaries. In operation, many of these equipment developments will be out of sight beneath the waves. Another set of first-time achievements will be even more invisible – deep down inside Thunder Horse’s wells.

O’Connell notes that having five completions engineers in the design team alone, compared to a more usual one or two, was an indication of the work that had to be done.

‘We were doing virtually everything from scratch, and had to question even the most basic assumptions. For example, with wells flowing at 50,000bpd, could the whole completions string vibrate itself to pieces? Answering such questions required an extensive testing and quality assurance programme for the many new components. It is astounding to think that of the 32 major components in a 140mm diameter Thunder Horse completions string, 18 of these are classed as “Serial Number Ones” – that is to say, they are the first of their kind ever made. You might expect one or two Number Ones in a completion. But certainly not eighteen.’

The 18 new design components were just the tip of the iceberg – a further seven were existing designs that had to be modified. And by the time the operations team had developed ways to install and operate the completions strings, a further 89 Serial Number Ones were notched up”.